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“How do you like your new school?”
“I like it very much.”

When I first heard the dialogue, I thought how is used to denote to what extent, and this draws the answer of very much. But there’s none of this kind of usages in the dictionaries. So I got this second thought: (A) how denotes in what way, and this is matched with the whole answer I like it very much.

However it doesn’t explain these words: “used to ask if something is good, bad, etc - How do you like the soup? (Webster’s). If this is applied, the 'I like it very much’ would be meaning I’m on the state of liking it very much or it’s very good on me.

How do I have to understand the how?

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  • The phrase is more how do you like something - "how do you like the weather, how do you like your job, your studies, etc.
    – jimsug
    Jun 21, 2014 at 6:06
  • @Listenever Here is my intuition. This how is an open question, and a typical response would be similar to those to a how much do you like question, but it allows you to add your opinion, e.g. "How do you like it?" "I like it very much, but I wish our football field would be a little bigger." So, basically, it's to what extent and in what way merged into one, and used for asking for someone's opinion. This is just my intuition, though.
    – Damkerng T.
    Jun 21, 2014 at 7:25

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In Collins how its sense 6:

6) to what extent, degree, amount, etc.

When you say:

How do you like your new school?

you are really saying:

How much do you like your new school?

The clue is in the response “I like it very much.”

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